Closing the Expectation Gap: How Individual Hope Is Good for Us All

You sit with your friends in the SAS library, half-listening to their conversations. Across the room, you spot someone you know from class. You want to ask them about an assignment you don’t quite understand, or maybe just say hi; you've always felt that you had a connection in class, even though they hang out with a different group. For a moment, you get up, but then you stop yourself. They’re probably busy, you think, it would be awkward. They’d wonder why I’m even talking to them. So you stay where you are, and the moment passes. The person across the room never knows you were thinking about them. You never find out if they might have been just as interested in talking to you. As humans, we are inherently social beings, but we are not nearly as good at socialising as we think we are. 

Researchers have been studying moments like these for almost a decade, trying to understand why we so often assume the worst about others and how wrong our negative assumptions tend to be. In one of the simplest experiments, participants were asked to write a heartfelt letter to a teacher, friend, or mentor who had made a meaningful difference in their lives. They poured their thanks onto the page, saying all the things they had always hoped to say. Before delivering the letters, the participants were asked to predict how the recipient would feel. Almost everyone predicted awkwardness. Maybe the recipient would be touched, they thought, but not overly so. Some even worried the letter might embarrass the person reading it. Yet when the letters were delivered, many recipients cried. Some said they would treasure the letter for years to come. The actual impact far exceeded the writer's expectations. In group after group, Participants dramatically underestimated the positive impact of their own kindness. The researchers referred to this misperception as miscalibrated social cognition, the idea that we are systemically wrong about how others will respond to our prosocial actions. Miscalibrated social cognition often manifests into social cynicism, the underlying suspicion that other people are less generous, fair, and empathetic than they truly are.  

Researchers wondered whether the effect extended beyond close relationships to interactions with strangers. To find out, they ran another experiment, this time on Chicago trains. Commuters were randomly assigned to one of two conditions. Half were instructed to strike up a friendly conversation with a stranger on their commute, while the other half were told to sit in silence, as usual. Almost every participant predicted the conversation would be uncomfortable. They assumed that nobody actually wanted to interact with a stranger on their morning commute. In reality, their conversations went far better than predicted. Afterwards, participants and strangers alike reported feeling happier and more energized. Variations of this experiment were repeated in coffee shops, on sidewalks, and in classrooms. Each time, the same pattern emerged: humans consistently underestimated how much others respond positively to, and value connection. 

Over time, these private biases create a public story that shapes the culture of a community. In a recent Stanford University study, researchers surveyed thousands of students, asking them to rate their agreement with a series of statements designed to measure empathy and prosocial behavior. Some statements were self-focused: I am likely to listen to someone’s problems to try to improve how they feel. Other statements invited respondents to assess their peers: the average student at Stanford is likely to listen to someone’s problems to try to improve how they feel. Overwhelmingly, the students self-reported that they see themselves as caring, fair, and willing to help. But when asked about expectations of other Stanford students, the numbers plunged. The main researcher, Dr. Jamil Zaki, described the results “as if there were two Stanfords existing side by side. The real one, full of students who were, on average, deeply compassionate. And the imagined one, where everyone assumes their peers were cold and self-interested.” The more a student underestimated their peers, the more they reported feeling lonelier, isolated, and less satisfied with their social lives. They were less willing to take social risks (put themselves out there), creating a negative social loop that reinforced socially cynical attitudes. These characteristics showed a fractured community. It didn't matter how kind students were; it was about how kind other students believed them to be. 

The Stanford researchers took the next step: if the problem was that students didn't realize how much everyone else cared, they decided to investigate what would happen if they closed the gap between students’ perceptions of others and the "true" state of the community. They created an intervention group, posted flyers in certain dorms, and held meetings to present the data they had collected about students’ reported empathy. Over time, those who were shown the data began to rate community members higher, were more willing to take social risks, and reported greater happiness. And it spread. In dorms where only select students were shown the data, researchers discovered that other students who didn't have direct exposure to the information still experienced a significant shift in perception of their peers, as well as gains in happiness and social risk-taking. Reducing social cynicism in smaller groups triggered a chain reaction that infused hope throughout the Stanford community.

At Singapore American School (SAS), where I am a senior, the halls are bright and noisy. On the surface, it appears connected and lively. However, beneath that energy, there are quiet currents of social cynicism hesitations, assumptions, fears of judgment, and doubts about how much others care. I replicated the Stanford study at SAS. Surveying students across the high school, I asked them to evaluate the same pairs of statements about their own behavior and the perceived behavior of their peers. The data revealed that SAS is a community of kind and compassionate people. Over 96% of people responded positively to scenarios examining empathy, willingness to help, and engage with others. 

Yet, time and again, the billions of surveys we take reveal a school struggling with a sense of belonging, toxic grade culture, and a lack of community. Suppose my data convinced us that our peers are authentically empathetic, interested in social engagement, open to new friendships, and willing to help. Could this create a community-wide sense of hope that might solve the long-term struggles inhibiting our community from taking full advantage of the talents and character of our members? I, for one, am hopeful to see what we could achieve.